Dozens of patients allege unnecessary heart surgery

A lawsuit brought on behalf of 82 patients who were allegedly subjected to unnecessary cardiac surgery at Redding Medical Center, Redding, northern California, has been filed in a Californian county superior court.

Nine of the 82 patients later died, and some of the deaths have been attributed to the unnecessary surgery, the lawsuit says. It further contends that a deliberate push for high profits prompted the hospital and doctors to perform inordinate numbers of highly profitable heart procedures, whether they were necessary or not.

Last October the …